Death Grips – Get Got
Death Grips. Death. Grips. Even the name sounds unpalatable, closer to (s)avant DC HC than major label rap prospect. But major label signing they are, and the rap band that once described themselves as “Raw. Raw like wet pennies. Post-Christian, Post-Satan” and released the blistering experience of a mixtape ‘Ex-Military’ (streaming below) have signed to Epic.
Even by the standards of the underground to which they belonged until a few moments ago, these guys are extreme. Formed of rapper Stefan Burnett and production team Zach Hill & Andy Morin, (according to Wikipedia – other outlets are vague about members), their online presence is as likely to fire your imagination as induce a migrane and their London debut at the Old Blue Last was a bloody, blazing row. So, it’s quite major that the their labelmates now include Fiona Apple and Brandy, and whether or not you can stomach more than ten minutes of their music, the signing says a lot about not only the quality of the rap avant garde, but also the state of major labels in America.
Greeting this is a track Get Got. At once a throwback to the gully-er time of YouTube skatevideos, it also reminds me of Spike Jonze’s fisheye-and-weird-shit-happening school of rap videos, with the threat level somewhere around infrared. Which is a cool way of thinking about what Death Grips do – the 90s alternative-and-proud avant rap punk stance updated to the darker days of unending war and collapsing markets. Take the money, and nothing lying down. Inspirational days, and glad they get got.
